Grant: Travel Awards - Institute Community Support

Cardiovascular risk factors and disease prevalence are higher in females with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) than those without. Physical activity can reduce this risk in other populations but the effectiveness in females with PCOS is unclear since studies have shown both positive and negative results. This might be since exercise intervention studies are only done for a short time and it takes longer to see the results. To fix this we brought in trained females with and without PCOS (CTRL) and compared cardiovascular risk factors that are known to be dysregulated in untrained females with PCOS (hemodynamics, endothelial function, and body composition), We recruited young (18-35yrs) lean females (body mass index [BMI]<25kg/m2) who had done at least of 5 hours of moderate-vigorous physical activity weekly over the last year and matched 7 PCOS to 7 CTRL for age and BMI. We measured hemodynamics as their resting heart rate and blood pressure, endothelial function was tested using a brachial flow-mediated dilation (FMD) test, and body composition was tested using dual X-ray absorptiometry. No metric of blood pressure was different between PCOS and CTRL. However, females with PCOS did have a slightly higher resting heart rate than the CTRL's. Endothelial function was not different between PCOS and CTRL. Lastly, body composition and fat distribution was similar between those with PCOS and those without. This means that the majority of measures were similar between PCOS and CTRL which gives early proof that habitual physical activity may work to counteract some of the known negative cardiovascular effects of PCOS.